Despite a good first album,
On the Brink,
Five Play took their sweet time recording Five Play...Plus in 2004. The "Plus" indicates outside players on several tracks, but even without these players,
Five Play remind one of a scaled-down big band. For those unfamiliar with the group, it's interesting to note that unlike 99 percent of the active jazz units playing today, the band is all female, a fact that's even more unusual when one notes that none of them sing. Fronted by drummer
Sherrie Maricle,
Five Play consist of two saxophonists, tenor
Anat Cohen and alto
Karolina Strassmayer, a pianist, Tomoko Ohno, and bassist Noriko Ueda. The lively arrangements give a number of traditional songs --
Dave Brubeck's "Theme from Mr. Broadway" and
Lew Brown/
Sammy Fain's "That Old Feeling" -- fresh treatments.
Five Play deliver fairly traditional mainstream jazz, but their eclectic choice of material -- "If I Only Had a Brain" and "On the Good Ship Lollipop" -- gives them a distinct edge. On half the tracks, the band is joined by either trumpeter/flügelhornist
Jami Dauber or Barbara Laronga. This gives songs like
Hank Mobley's "Funk in a Deep Freeze" and
Chick Corea's "Bud Powell" an even bigger sound. Five Play...Plus is a good album by a good group, and with any luck, it will serve to introduce
Five Play to an appreciative audience. ~ Ronnie D. Lankford Jr.